December 2, 2005

I'm a Uniter

In an effort to get Tyler and Laura to come together, I present a death penalty policy so horrific that they can both condemn it. Singapore just hanged, hanged! an Australian man for drug smuggling. He was caught at the airport with 14 ounces of heroin. This is taking the war on drugs to a whole new god-awful level. Holding 0.53 ounces of heroin draws a mandatory death penalty in Singapore. Singapore has executed more than 100 people for drug-related offenses since 1999. In 2003 a man was executed for trying to carry 2 pounds of pot into the Country. A death penalty for pot!

5 comments:

Alright, I will agree that such a penalty for drug possesion is ridiculous.

The death pentaly (while its still legal in most US states) should only be used in the most serious crimes. Maybe it will be abolished entirely at somepoint, but we at least use it for the truely nasty criminals.

Singapore is f****ed up, big time. I wouldn't even advocate the death penalty for someone who committed 1st degree murder (in some circumstances)! But 2 lbs of pot!? Damn.

Jesus, that's beyond absurd!

It just goes to show ya, that most of the countries in this world that aren't America, just plain suck!

See, Tyler...here was a point we could both agree upon. The death penalty for drug possesion is idiotic. But, then you gotta go and ruin what could be perfect agreement by saying that most countries that aren't America just plain suck.

Yes, Singapore's drug laws suck. But, the death penalty is an antiquated form of punishment that is neither just nor humane. Over half the countries in the world have abolished the death penalty. Using the death penalty puts on the same footing as Iran and China when it comes to humane punishments.

As I've said before, it's not enough for the U.S. to be better than some when it comes to human rights violations. Since we are trying to dictate global policy on human rights, we should be than evey other country in the world.

Okay, I'll willingly grant that I would rather live in the U.S. if my only other choices were corrupt war-ridden countries in Africa or the Middle East. For the most part, I'm pretty happy to be an American, I'm even (gasp) a bit patriotic.

That doesn't mean that I think America doesn't have tons and tons of room for improvement. America was one of the last "civilized" countries to abolish slavery. Also one of the last "civilized" countries to grant equal rights to minorities. And we're among the last of the "civilized" countries who still use the death penalty. (And don't me started on gay marriage)

So, yeah, America's great because by and large the government only screws us a little bit, and we can say what we want with little fear of reprisal and in theory there's opportunities here that don't exist elsewhere. However, we're the ones out there throwing our military weight around and telling other countries how they should be run. That means we need to be better than mostly okay. We need to be the leaders of human rights developments, not the ones who are dragged along in the wake of our more enlightened allies.